Cake competition announced  for this weekend’s SpringFest

By Jeremy Weldon
SpringFest is having a birthday – number 20. A birthday cake competition has been announced to commemorate the milestone.
First Baptist Church will host the competition in the building across from Square Cafe. To enter, contestants should notify student minister Jeremy Richey this week and submit their entries no later than Friday (May 18) at 6 p.m.
Richey may be contacted at jlrichey@gmail.com, or by calling the church at 563-7655.
Entries should include a contestant’s name, phone number, and type of cake that will be submitted.
Judging will begin Saturday morning when gates open for the festival, and continue until 3 p.m. The winner will be announced from the Main Stage that night.
Votes will be cast by SpringFest visitors at $1 each. All proceeds from the competition will be donated to Grace Place, a new ministry recently announced in Batesville.
The winner of the cake competition will receive a $100 gift certificate from Stubb’s Department Store.
Richey said cakes should have a SpringFest theme, and celebrate the 20-year milestone. Anyone with questions or suggestions can contact him by email or telephone.
Batesville’s Square first hosted the annual SpringFest in 1998 with a few carnival rides and a handful of vendors.
This weekend’s affair is expected to draw 15,000 people downtown, many of them visitors from neighboring counties.
Merchants of all kinds anticipate a surge in sales, and weather forecasts – at least early this week – indicate festival revelers can expect hot, but dry, weather.
SpringFest has steadily grown over the years, mostly because organizers carefully plan the events, from the accompanying 5K race to the carnival rides and entertainment.
Batesville’s Main Street office puts on the festival and chooses national music acts to headline the event each year.
Eric Paslay signed with EMI Records in Nashville in 2011, and has written several country hits for other artists and recorded his own chart-topping singles “Friday Night,” “Song about a Girl,” and “She Don’t Love You.”
In the last two SpringFest years, the cornhole tournament has gained popularity and teams from all over the Southeast – some coming from several states away – will travel to Batesville to compete in the SpringFest tournament.
Nationally, cornhole events have spread to many such fairs and festivals, and Panola County’s Young Professionals group has seized the chance to promote both the city and county through the local competition.
Cornhole, this spring, has begun to be televised nationally by ESPN, and the best of the bean-bag throwers have reportedly earn considerable sums playing the game with rules similar to those of horseshoes.